Cambridge Bitter
Machine House Brewery

Cambridge BitterCambridge Bitter
Beer Geek Stats
From:
Machine House Brewery
 
Washington, United States
Style:
English Bitter
ABV:
3.8%
Score:
Needs more ratings
Avg:
3.78 | pDev: 5.29%
Reviews:
5
Ratings:
8
Status:
Active
Rated:
Apr 30, 2023
Added:
Apr 28, 2018
Wants:
  0
Gots:
  2
Traditional ordinary bitter brewed with Golden Promise malt from Norfolk, England, and UK grown Progress hops.
Recent ratings and reviews.
Ratings by dshansen1184:
Photo of dshansen1184
Rated by dshansen1184 from Washington

3.67/5  rDev -2.9%
look: 4 | smell: 3.75 | taste: 3.5 | feel: 3.75 | overall: 3.75

Nov 19, 2022
More User Ratings:
Photo of mactrail
Reviewed by mactrail from Washington

3.51/5  rDev -7.1%
look: 4 | smell: 3.5 | taste: 3.5 | feel: 3.25 | overall: 3.5
Clear dark amber brew with adequate foam in the Stella goblet. Plenty of spritz in the mouth. Pleasant herbal hop aroma with straw. Surprisingly malty tasting with a distinct bitter aftertaste. Flavors of cereal, a hint of lemon, and the increasingly bitter hops. A decent thirst-quenching quaff. From the 500 ml bottle purchased at Central Market in Shoreline. The label warns about pouring all and once, and there is quite a bit of sediment
Apr 30, 2023
 
Rated: 4.12 by SushiSakeBeer from Oregon

Oct 20, 2022
Photo of flagmantho
Reviewed by flagmantho from Washington

3.89/5  rDev +2.9%
look: 3.75 | smell: 4 | taste: 4 | feel: 3 | overall: 4
Poured from 500mL bottle into a dimpled mug.

Appearance: dark orange hue with a little bit of haze, probably due to bottle conditioning. There's practically no head at all, just a few bubbles; this is not surprising at all for a Machine House beer. They deliver the cask right from the bottle!

Smell: malty and floral, but there's definitely a sense of the bitter hops to come.

Taste: quite malty with a fair dose of bready, biscuity character, and a nice round bitterness to back it all up. A very nice bitter; bracing yet refreshing, and a lot of flavor packed in for 3.8%.

Mouthfeel: medium body with a darn low carbonation. I mean, I know that this is how it is supposed to be served, but I like some creaminess!

Overall: despite its (intentional) flatness, it is still an extremely refreshing and quaffable beer. I could drink rather quite a lot of this.
Sep 02, 2021
Photo of Pivopijak
Reviewed by Pivopijak from Washington

3.84/5  rDev +1.6%
look: 4.25 | smell: 4 | taste: 3.75 | feel: 3.75 | overall: 3.75
bottle into glass
No head. Semi clear, medium orange with a hue of gold. Subtle, sweet floral malt aroma. Decent, medium bodied, subtly hopped, malted beer.
Jun 25, 2021
Photo of kemoarps
Reviewed by kemoarps from New York

3.59/5  rDev -5%
look: 4 | smell: 4.25 | taste: 3 | feel: 4.25 | overall: 3.5
I'd had it stored in the fridge, but I took it out to let it approach 'cask' type temperatures before pouring.
Pours the colour of warm honey. Lots of active little bubbles visible on the glass. Small swell of head initially settles down to a very fine velvety looking half moon around the edge. Not 'hazy' as the current trend of beers has claimed the term, but certainly not clear, and five years ago I probably would have referred to it as hazy in appearance.

Nose is initially the golden promise. Rich bready malts with a touch of caramel sweet to them. Earthy grains and subtle earthy/grassy hops.

As you might expect from a 3.8% beer, it is very restrained. It's an interesting contrast, because there are levels of hte flavour that are pretty thin and almost watery, but the body is actually more medium-chewy, and there's certainly some robustness to elements of the flavour as well. The rich deep malts that dominated the nose are where the thinness comes in, as they almost completely disappear. In contrast, the hops, which were so subtle and understated on the nose, are the primary driver of the flavour here. The bitter grows and is actually pretty damn pronounced, especially without any malt base to counter/support it. The GF described it as tasting like bitter water. At the very least I suppose it's a good showcase for the progress hops themselves. They're earthy and dull-bitter, somewhat grassy, and almost menthol/tarragon kind of twist to it.

As mentioned previously: there's actually a decent amount of body in there for how small it is in other areas, and what initially looked to contain a whole lot of bubbles, settles down to a more appropriate moderate set of pinpricks.

It's too bad, because there's a lot of elements that were gearing up to paint this as something I quite enjoyed, but ultimately it's too one dimensional for me and just doesn't quite hit the spot, personally.
Mar 20, 2021
 
Rated: 3.63 by jason_nwx from Oregon

Jul 24, 2020
Photo of LiquidAmber
Reviewed by LiquidAmber from Washington

3.96/5  rDev +4.8%
look: 3.75 | smell: 4 | taste: 4 | feel: 3.75 | overall: 4
Poured into a Samuel Smith pint glass. Pours a slightly hazy, medium coppery amber with little visible carbonation and no head, just a few stray bubbles. Aroma of pale and biscuit malt, light grassy hops, dark fruit; slightly earthy and floral. Flavor is biscuit malt, grassy hops, hay, hints of mint, vague dark fruit, brown bread and bit earthy. Medium bodied with slight creaminess and moderate carbonation, satisfactory despite the near still pour. A classic tasting English bitter with authentic malt and hop character. The carbonation is somewhat low, but in style. Really nice depth of malt flavor considering the low ABV. It's nice to revisit the old English styles every once in a while and Machine House presents them very nicely.
Feb 28, 2020
Cambridge Bitter from Machine House Brewery
Beer rating: 3.78 out of 5 with 8 ratings